Simple Code Fix/Feature (Cancel)

[Agrajag]

So here's a simple one I suspect many of us have experienced:

I begin to say, "American 1289, Runway Niner....." and then we realize we meant to say something else so we key right back up and say, "American 1289, Taxi to Ramp".

We then get back, "Taxi to Ramp, American 1289" and then something like, "Negative", or "Can you repeat?"

So my suggestion would be that if the code receives and incomplete or somehow faulty command for an aircraft and then immediately gets another one, either simply ignore it or, at the most append something simple to the start of the response to the second command like perhaps, "Uh, okay. Taxi to Ramp, American 1289."

It saves time and is more realistic.

[ATControl -- Joe]

37 minutes ago, Agrajag said:

So here's a simple one I suspect many of us have experienced:

I begin to say, "American 1289, Runway Niner....." and then we realize we meant to say something else so we key right back up and say, "American 1289, Taxi to Ramp".

We then get back, "Taxi to Ramp, American 1289" and then something like, "Negative", or "Can you repeat?"

So my suggestion would be that if the code receives and incomplete or somehow faulty command for an aircraft and then immediately gets another one, either simply ignore it or, at the most append something simple to the start of the response to the second command like perhaps, "Uh, okay. Taxi to Ramp, American 1289."

It saves time and is more realistic.

This is a fault of game code that is well overdue for updates.  You will have to wait for the next version of the game for a change of that nature 

[FeelThere Ariel]

Thank you! We will consider it for "TowerX" as it has been nicknamed. What would be the correct phraseology for the correction made by a controller? "Revise instructions" or "correction", etc.?  

[Agrajag]

1 hour ago, FeelThere Ariel said:

Thank you! We will consider it for "TowerX" as it has been nicknamed. What would be the correct phraseology for the correction made by a controller? "Revise instructions" or "correction", etc.?  

They generally don't give a correction. You'll hear it in real life. They MAY say "Ignore that" or "Correction", but often they don't even do that much.

The way I see it is that you have responses in a queue somewhere and I ASSUME there's a short delay in case I speak again quickly after each command. So, even if I give several wrong commands in a row, as long as the LAST one is correct, you can simply delete all the previous ones from the queue.

"American 1289, Runway Niner"

"American 1289, Vacate"

"American 1289, uh"

"American 1289, Taxi to Ramp."

That would result in receiving "Taxi to Ramp, American 1289" with no mention of the other "commands". Or as mentioned, you might optionally, randomly respond with "I think I got that. Taxi to the ramp, American 1289."

For what it's worth this would tie into a much bigger feature I'd like to see which we worked into older ATC software projects that allow the controller to provide varied commands (instead of always using the exact same phrases) and, more importantly a large matrix that allows for every response to actually pull randomly from a list of set responses. The end result is that session feels entirely realistic as the pilots end up using very varied responses. What might be useful for you, given that you use a TTS engine, would be to have all these responses in an XML file and allow users to edit it so that they can go ahead an add as many as they want. You could provide like say, three per response and a user could add 30 per response. All you need to do is read the XML on load, find out how many each response has and have them ready. It's just text so the overhead is minimal, but the result is pretty amazing. 

Thus, "Taxi to Ramp" could be the main response, but also under it have:

"Taxi to the Ramp"

"Off to the Ramp."

"Head to the Ramp."

"Heading to the Ramp."

And so on. 

In one product we worked on we had pilots that had such a deep list of responses that you rarely felt like you heard the same ones twice in the same session. Using playback parameters we even could take common phrases like, "Taxi to the Ramp, American 1289" and have it sound a bit different each time. Sometimes it would emphasize "Taxi" and sometimes "Ramp". Other times it would drag out a word like American so that on one playback it was "American" and on another it was played back as "Uhhhh Merican 1289". The sky is truly the limit on this stuff.

[707FAN]

One I experiences especially at YMML where there are  heavy departures from Rwy  34 & others from  27, is after departing one from 34, you want the 27 departure to get going quickly, I accidently call XXX rwy 34, then stop & realise I should have said Rwy 27, There is no way that I know of to cancel the RWY 34 call  and correct it to rwy 27. The aircraft then decided to taxi to 34 . Sometimes if you call XXX rwy 27 it will stay there but if something is on final on 27 it has to go around.

The fix would be as done by ATC in Aus. XXX Rwy 34 correction Rwy 27 cleared for T/O.

Also some plain language call would be good as quite often in Aus, the conversation can get fairly casual if the traffic flow is low. Instructions like taxi to the terminal using any way you like would add some interest to the game. 

Kev M

[Avwriter]

It would be simpler if there was just a keyboard button that instantly canceled the current command cleared the text  box. 

 

Andrew

[FeelThere Ariel]

On Australia, assuming it is ICAO rules, the standard phraseology would then be "Correction" or "Revise instructions" (or in some cases when you just want the aircraft to completely ignore any instructions previously given, "disregard" is the word)  as in any other ICAO country, but just wanted to know if there is any FAA standard phrase used for correction? 

[Agrajag]

2 hours ago, Avwriter said:

It would be simpler if there was just a keyboard button that instantly canceled the current command cleared the text  box. 

The problem may be that you're holding a the Left-Shift key at that point. It may be awkward to add a key to that. Perhaps like the C key for "Correction", but it's still potentially strange. Right now when playing I use my left index finger to hold that key. With this I'd need to switch to making it my pinky or such so that my index finger could be ready to hit the C key. Plus I could miss and hit B which means breaking concentration to look up to see that the box clears. My goal would be to not have to bother with any of that. Have the code see the mistake and just respond like humans would makes it all clean in the end to my view.

 

[Studders1]

On 9/11/2019 at 9:51 PM, FeelThere Ariel said:

Thank you! We will consider it for "TowerX" as it has been nicknamed. What would be the correct phraseology for the correction made by a controller? "Revise instructions" or "correction", etc.?  

Just out of interest, how come you won't fix issues with the game but still create chargeable DLC for it?

[FeelThere_Vic]

1 hour ago, Studders1 said:

Just out of interest, how come you won't fix issues with the game but still create chargeable DLC for it?

It's not that we are not fixing it but each software has it's own cycle. We released numerous SPs for this version of Tower!3D and now it's time to move into the next version with many exciting new features.
I saw your other posts and one needed to be moderated; you are more than welcomed here with suggestions and technical issues, but this is not a place to start a flame war. It's a very friendly community and lots of the members are making contributions for the game. Please don't try to ruin it. If you have any of your suggestion regarding the game please let us know, i is possible it will make the next version.

 

Thank you and have a great day 🙂 

 

Vic

[Studders1]

15 minutes ago, FeelThere said:

It's not that we are not fixing it but each software has it's own cycle. We released numerous SPs for this version of Tower!3D and now it's time to move into the next version with many exciting new features.
I saw your other posts and one needed to be moderated; you are more than welcomed here with suggestions and technical issues, but this is not a place to start a flame war. It's a very friendly community and lots of the members are making contributions for the game. Please don't try to ruin it. If you have any of your suggestion regarding the game please let us know, i is possible it will make the next version.

 

Thank you and have a great day 🙂 

 

Vic

I appreciate the reply. Honestly I'm not here to start a flame war either. I am purely just curious as to why the DLC is priced so highly and then to be complete requires a separate purchase? I'm really enjoying Tower!3D, would love to purchase more airports but just can't justify the £300 price tag =/. 

 

Thanks 😃

[Agrajag]

1 hour ago, Studders1 said:

I appreciate the reply. Honestly I'm not here to start a flame war either. I am purely just curious as to why the DLC is priced so highly and then to be complete requires a separate purchase? I'm really enjoying Tower!3D, would love to purchase more airports but just can't justify the £300 price tag =/. 

Then don't spend that amount. The game is entirely playable as shipped with three airports. I too find the whole Real Color, Real Traffic approach a bit different, but there'a a reality here with this sort of product that's dramatically different from many other products and that's the size of the community. I've gotten first-hand professional experience with that community going back to the very first ATC product on the PC. It's a SMALL community. Very few people, comparatively, enjoy this sort of simulation over other related sims like flight simulators. It's a subset of a subset. Just look at the industry. Where is Wesson International today? They were the first and built a multi-award-winning product that was highly respected and they couldn't make the business model work selling the product as a whole. Where is Xavius today? They sold the second-most popular ATC simulator, and the tiny team there also couldn't keep the lights on. The two companies were both forced to move into selling a professional level product to the ATC industry. 

So, if you're going to make it in this sector (no pun intended) you need to find new ways to generate additional income. No one says you need to own every single piece of a product. I own X-Plane, but I don't own every piece of add-on software made for it. That would cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars! Sure, those products come from different companies, but only because that community is so vibrant. There were times when X-Planes community wasn't very active and you had to make due with pretty much the core product. 

I own seven airports in T3D Pro. I bought them over two years. Each one was a minor investment generally under $25 each. Most people spend more than that at a movie and get two hours of entertainment out of that. I've certainly gotten more than two hours of entertainment out of each of these airports. 

[Studders1]

29 minutes ago, Agrajag said:

Then don't spend that amount. The game is entirely playable as shipped with three airports. I too find the whole Real Color, Real Traffic approach a bit different, but there'a a reality here with this sort of product that's dramatically different from many other products and that's the size of the community. I've gotten first-hand professional experience with that community going back to the very first ATC product on the PC. It's a SMALL community. Very few people, comparatively, enjoy this sort of simulation over other related sims like flight simulators. It's a subset of a subset. Just look at the industry. Where is Wesson International today? They were the first and built a multi-award-winning product that was highly respected and they couldn't make the business model work selling the product as a whole. Where is Xavius today? They sold the second-most popular ATC simulator, and the tiny team there also couldn't keep the lights on. The two companies were both forced to move into selling a professional level product to the ATC industry. 

So, if you're going to make it in this sector (no pun intended) you need to find new ways to generate additional income. No one says you need to own every single piece of a product. I own X-Plane, but I don't own every piece of add-on software made for it. That would cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars! Sure, those products come from different companies, but only because that community is so vibrant. There were times when X-Planes community wasn't very active and you had to make due with pretty much the core product. 

I own seven airports in T3D Pro. I bought them over two years. Each one was a minor investment generally under $25 each. Most people spend more than that at a movie and get two hours of entertainment out of that. I've certainly gotten more than two hours of entertainment out of each of these airports. 

I understand where you are coming from and yes it's a very niche market. Your reply makes a lot of sense to me and yeah I can see how the DLC price can be justified due to all of that. Very nice comparison to X-Plane there!

I guess the thing what surprised me the most was the costs of the add on for the DLC's, and I know, you don't need it to play or even enjoy the game. It just feels like its a "Try this airport for £15 and if you like it, spend more to make it the finished version." 

The other perspective I have is that because it's a niche market you are putting potential customers off because of the price, if it was a little cheaper I think people would be more encouraged to buy the DLC. You are correct though with the movie comparison too. I've certainly had a lot of enjoyment off the original 3 so far! Apologies if I came across in a bitter way, like I said, I'm new around here and the prices just surprised me! The devs of course need to fund the next version somehow, sorry I flex off the handle! 

[Agrajag]

2 hours ago, Studders1 said:

I understand where you are coming from and yes it's a very niche market. Your reply makes a lot of sense to me and yeah I can see how the DLC price can be justified due to all of that. Very nice comparison to X-Plane there!

I guess the thing what surprised me the most was the costs of the add on for the DLC's, and I know, you don't need it to play or even enjoy the game. It just feels like its a "Try this airport for £15 and if you like it, spend more to make it the finished version." 

I guess I'm used to my background where data disks and such were a common thing. You wouldn't expect to be given next year's new data for the game you bought last year. In fact, to make MORE money franchises like Madden decided to just make you buy an entirely new game every year instead of just buying the new data for a perfectly fine and working older game. 

As noted, there is a hint of this being different in the way FT goes about it. I would LOVE to see the numbers comparing the sales of just the airport with no RC. I do already know a couple other people that told me they couldn't care less about the real carriers. They just enjoy the juggling aspect of the game. If you're into the real carriers then your mindset will default to feeling that nearly everyone would want that. The way I choose to view it is that the cost of the airport, as I want it, is the price of both pieces. I justify that, almost entirely, due to knowing how small this community is. 

I also think two markets are crashing together and causing confusion and challenges. The mobile market, where games are often well under $10, is creating a whole generation of buyers that feel the cost of games should be much lower. Trust me, as a QA professional, one thing these people are not factoring in is that a PC product is a TOTALLY different world than a phone product. The phone product builds to a very defined specification to work on say, Android. The variations are minimized and if you don't think your product will work with X phone you simply turn off that phone as an option and that phone cannot install your game. On the PC the sky is the limit and there are literally countless combinations which means support is exponentially harder. 

Also, for what it's worth, this is an odd situation for me as I am usually on the other side of these arguments. I used to write a column for the major gaming publications that was mainly about consumer advocacy and calling out nearly every publisher for terrible practices. I have a trail of upset publishers in my wake. In this case, what I see is a very small publisher trying their best to make a go of a game in a market where no one will ever get rich off sales. It's sort of a no-win situation so I'm just glad anyone is trying it.

Go look up ATC Windows. It's from a great guy (and mainly housed on Yahoo) Alan Key-Williams. It's a wonderful product that really nails the TRACON model. It was in beta for years and had a comparatively huge following with lots of community interaction. Then he realized he'd hit the wall and needed to raise funds so he started charging for it. When the beta versions expired the interest started to dry up and now it can go months between people posting anything about it. 

[Studders1]

1 hour ago, Agrajag said:

I guess I'm used to my background where data disks and such were a common thing. You wouldn't expect to be given next year's new data for the game you bought last year. In fact, to make MORE money franchises like Madden decided to just make you buy an entirely new game every year instead of just buying the new data for a perfectly fine and working older game. 

As noted, there is a hint of this being different in the way FT goes about it. I would LOVE to see the numbers comparing the sales of just the airport with no RC. I do already know a couple other people that told me they couldn't care less about the real carriers. They just enjoy the juggling aspect of the game. If you're into the real carriers then your mindset will default to feeling that nearly everyone would want that. The way I choose to view it is that the cost of the airport, as I want it, is the price of both pieces. I justify that, almost entirely, due to knowing how small this community is. 

 

Well i did end up buying real traffic to get the names of the carriers, the colours I wouldn't really notice anyway I don't think. The juggling aspect is really addictive, feels like a mind training game haha! 

 

1 hour ago, Agrajag said:

I also think two markets are crashing together and causing confusion and challenges. The mobile market, where games are often well under $10, is creating a whole generation of buyers that feel the cost of games should be much lower. Trust me, as a QA professional, one thing these people are not factoring in is that a PC product is a TOTALLY different world than a phone product. The phone product builds to a very defined specification to work on say, Android. The variations are minimized and if you don't think your product will work with X phone you simply turn off that phone as an option and that phone cannot install your game. On the PC the sky is the limit and there are literally countless combinations which means support is exponentially harder. 

Also, for what it's worth, this is an odd situation for me as I am usually on the other side of these arguments. I used to write a column for the major gaming publications that was mainly about consumer advocacy and calling out nearly every publisher for terrible practices. I have a trail of upset publishers in my wake. In this case, what I see is a very small publisher trying their best to make a go of a game in a market where no one will ever get rich off sales. It's sort of a no-win situation so I'm just glad anyone is trying it.

My immediate comparison was Euro Truck Simulator DLC but that one makes more sense because of the high popularity it's gained in recent years. Now I've done more research into this game I do realise I jumped the gun way too early, but I'm not afraid to apologise when I'm wrong. Apologies @FeelThere and @FeelThere Ariel! It's not much but I did a positive steam review.

 

1 hour ago, Agrajag said:

Go look up ATC Windows. It's from a great guy (and mainly housed on Yahoo) Alan Key-Williams. It's a wonderful product that really nails the TRACON model. It was in beta for years and had a comparatively huge following with lots of community interaction. Then he realized he'd hit the wall and needed to raise funds so he started charging for it. When the beta versions expired the interest started to dry up and now it can go months between people posting anything about it. 

I will look into this, it does sound familiar, I'm wondering if I played this years ago.

[FeelThere Ariel]

No problem @Studders1, we are always open to feedback (especially when pointed out properly and correctly 😉 ), and we are definitely working hard to make the upcoming versions better and better each time! 🙂

[pdxpilot06]

On 9/12/2019 at 10:28 AM, FeelThere Ariel said:

On Australia, assuming it is ICAO rules, the standard phraseology would then be "Correction" or "Revise instructions" (or in some cases when you just want the aircraft to completely ignore any instructions previously given, "disregard" is the word)  as in any other ICAO country, but just wanted to know if there is any FAA standard phrase used for correction? 

I've listened to LAX Tower on LiveATC quite extensively. If a controller needs to change an instruction, the phraseology I've heard consistently is:

"Callsign, taxi via Hotel Papa, hold short of Runway 25R"

"Callsign, amend instruction, taxi via Hotel Tango, Hold short of Runway 25R."

Taxiway Papa was recently renamed to Taxiway Juliet so you won't actually hear Taxiway Papa anymore...just saying that they use "amend instruction" in the real world.